Herbert Jeffrey Hancock (born April 12 1940 in Chicago, Illinois) is an American jazz pianist and composer. Hancock is one of jazz music's most important and influential pianists and composers. He embraced elements of rock, funk, and soul while adopting freer stylistic elements from jazz. As part of Miles Davis's "second great quintet", Hancock helped redefine the role of a jazz rhythm section, and was one of the primary architects of the "post-bop" sound. Later, he was one of the first jazz musicians to embrace synthesizers and funk. Yet for all his restless experimentalism, Hancock's music is often melodic and accessible; he has had many songs "cross over" and achieve success among pop audiences. Hancock's best-known solo works include "Cantaloupe Island", "Watermelon Man" (later performed by dozens of musicians, including bandleader Mongo Santamaria), "Maiden Voyage", "Chameleon", and the single "Rockit" . Early life and

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